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Topic: Family breakfast (Read 11605 times)

I find it rude to pass judgement on how other people choose to interact or not. If someone is on their cell phone with me I can be annoyed etc.. But if they are with someone else that it up to them. For some people a chatty breakfast is like pokers in the eye. For others ( like me) I like a bit of conversation.

I totally agree with this. There is no indication that the dad had any problem with this. Now if he'd been trying to engage them in conversation and telling the kids to put their electronics away only to be ignored or talked back to, I'd think there was evidence that this was a situation where he was being ignored. But if that's ok for their family and no one at the table is upset, who are we to say they are rude to one another?

I understand some people are not morning people (my own DD), but so little time is spent together as families anymore so I emphasize electronic free meals at my house, and while I don't think it is for everyone, I would have raised my eyebrows at the scene OP saw. I see it a a lot and to me, it is so sad when a family can't turn things off for an hour to have a meal together. But I would never say anything, the thoughts would stay firmly in my own head.

I understand some people are not morning people (my own DD), but so little time is spent together as families anymore so I emphasize electronic free meals at my house, and while I don't think it is for everyone, I would have raised my eyebrows at the scene OP saw. I see it a a lot and to me, it is so sad when a family can't turn things off for an hour to have a meal together. But I would never say anything, the thoughts would stay firmly in my own head.

But you have no idea as to how they interact during other meals - maybe dinner is their usual-interaction time?

Dinnertime was our usual "family meal" - late Dh worked the night shift so he was never home before the kids got off to school. However, he was up by around 4 pm, substantially earlier than most 9 to 5 dads.

I don't think that anyone here is in a position to judge this particular family.

I understand some people are not morning people (my own DD), but so little time is spent together as families anymore so I emphasize electronic free meals at my house, and while I don't think it is for everyone, I would have raised my eyebrows at the scene OP saw. I see it a a lot and to me, it is so sad when a family can't turn things off for an hour to have a meal together. But I would never say anything, the thoughts would stay firmly in my own head.

But you have no idea as to how they interact during other meals - maybe dinner is their usual-interaction time?

Dinnertime was our usual "family meal" - late Dh worked the night shift so he was never home before the kids got off to school. However, he was up by around 4 pm, substantially earlier than most 9 to 5 dads.

I don't think that anyone here is in a position to judge this particular family.

It is also possible they homeschool and see at least one parent a whole lot during the day. I understand not wanting that dynamic for your own dining companions and family and find it perfectly reasonable. It probably isn't something we should impose on those who have no connection to us.

These people were not eating breakfast in their own home. They were dining out at a restaurant. This was a family with teenage kids. OP was the only one of us who was there and says the dad did not look impressed. Why can't we take that on face value and accept it for the purposes of the discussion? IMHO it is rude not to give your dining companions your full attention. The fact that the dad was left sitting on his own while his family were engaged with ipad/cell/ipod was pretty rude behavior on the part of his family IMO.

So be it if I'm in the minority.

I also don't feel OP was 'judgmental' or 'rude' in any way whatsoever to post this topic/observation about the family.

These people were not eating breakfast in their own home. They were dining out at a restaurant. This was a family with teenage kids. OP was the only one of us who was there and says the dad did not look impressed. Why can't we take that on face value and accept it for the purposes of the discussion? IMHO it is rude not to give your dining companions your full attention. The fact that the dad was left sitting on his own while his family were engaged with ipad/cell/ipod was pretty rude behavior on the part of his family IMO.

So be it if I'm in the minority.

I also don't feel OP was 'judgmental' or 'rude' in any way whatsoever to post this topic/observation about the family.

I tend to agree with this. While it is technically "judgmental" - we judge people all the time based on things we observe. I can't imagine how boring it would be to sit at a table in a restaurant where all of my dining companions are otherwise occupied.

Granted, the dad could have been perfectly content to sit there doing nothing, but I'd probably be feeling sorry for him too.

My family is certainly guilty of using electronics at the table, though not for the whole time and definitely not while we're eating.

Maybe he is not a morning person and his family has learned he would prefer silence while he wakes up and then eats. I certainly don't "look impressed" until I have been up for a few hours.

We don't do electronics while eating out only because once or twice in the past things have been left behind (recovered but used as a lesson). But we don't fill in the wait with chatter and once the food gets there we are too busy eating to be socializing. Lunch or dinner time? That's a different story. We actually have things to talk about (how the day has went, what we plan on doing later) vs nothing has happened since we went to bed and got up to eat.

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"I feel sarcasm is the lowest form of wit." "It is so low, in fact, that Miss Manners feels sure you would not want to resort to it yourself, even in your own defense. We do not believe in retaliatory rudeness." Judith Martin

These people were not eating breakfast in their own home. They were dining out at a restaurant. This was a family with teenage kids. OP was the only one of us who was there and says the dad did not look impressed. Why can't we take that on face value and accept it for the purposes of the discussion? IMHO it is rude not to give your dining companions your full attention. The fact that the dad was left sitting on his own while his family were engaged with ipad/cell/ipod was pretty rude behavior on the part of his family IMO.

So be it if I'm in the minority.

I also don't feel OP was 'judgmental' or 'rude' in any way whatsoever to post this topic/observation about the family.

I tend to agree with this. While it is technically "judgmental" - we judge people all the time based on things we observe. I can't imagine how boring it would be to sit at a table in a restaurant where all of my dining companions are otherwise occupied.

Granted, the dad could have been perfectly content to sit there doing nothing, but I'd probably be feeling sorry for him too.

My family is certainly guilty of using electronics at the table, though not for the whole time and definitely not while we're eating.

I think if the OP had said "Was at breakfast, noticed a family of mom, teen and tween all engaged in electronics and Dad just sitting their with no interaction and no conversation. Do you find this normal?" most of us would have said "No, we try to encourage engagement as much as possible with dining companions."

But I know in my response I was reacting to the tone of her post which came off overly judgemental; deciding that it was rude to the Dad, felt he was so neglected she had the urge to invite him to sit with them, that she was able to declare that he seemed used to being ignored, and that the encounter left her feeling like she'd rather eat at home.

I understand some people are not morning people (my own DD), but so little time is spent together as families anymore so I emphasize electronic free meals at my house, and while I don't think it is for everyone, I would have raised my eyebrows at the scene OP saw. I see it a a lot and to me, it is so sad when a family can't turn things off for an hour to have a meal together. But I would never say anything, the thoughts would stay firmly in my own head.

You're free to have those thoughts--but you are making an awful lot of assumptions.You are assuming that there is 'so little time' to spend together. You assume they 'cant turn things off for an hour'. Heck, it's assumptive to even state that 4 people who are having breakfast together are a family--for all I know, it could be the chauffeur and 3 family members or 2 adults hired to chaperone minors to an airport. It could be that the whole crew is traveling home from a funeral and are emotionally exhausted and need to escape. It could be that the male adult speaks a different language.It could be that being 'absent' from the family for an hour via electronics frees all of these people up to be 'present' from the family for the rest of the day.

If it's 4 people is it my style? no, not really. But it's not hurting anyone outside the family, so it's nobody's business.

We as a family don't talk much at restaurants being it's so noisy and busy. That could have been very well us as my husband likes to relax/stare out in space with his thoughts while the rest of us will do something during the lulls. At least the restaurants we go to, it tends to be loud. Maybe we would be different in a quiet restaurant but even then we would probably not talk since it's so quiet.

These people were not eating breakfast in their own home. They were dining out at a restaurant. This was a family with teenage kids. OP was the only one of us who was there and says the dad did not look impressed. Why can't we take that on face value and accept it for the purposes of the discussion? IMHO it is rude not to give your dining companions your full attention. The fact that the dad was left sitting on his own while his family were engaged with ipad/cell/ipod was pretty rude behavior on the part of his family IMO.

So be it if I'm in the minority.

I also don't feel OP was 'judgmental' or 'rude' in any way whatsoever to post this topic/observation about the family.

What bothered me about the original post wasn't the good or bad manners of the other family--it was how the "the new way" comment rang like yet another "kids these days and their gadgets" rant, when in reality people have been doing this same thing with newspapers and books for ages; how the post was really a vent anyway, which isn't allowed here; and the hyperbolic statement that the OP would forgo eating out if this was "the new way" to eat breakfast. I mean, why? Why can't the OP and her husband have a nice breakfast out if they want to, and they can talk to each other all they want during it? I just don't get how this other family had the power to ruin eating out for a pair of total strangers.

I agree. I would find the behavior odd but not rude. After all, they weren't doing anything noisy to annoy other tables.

Once, on a ship, we were assigned to a six person dinner table with a family of four like the one described. All four were texting or doing something else throughout the entire meal. THIS, we thought rude and asked the next day to be moved to another table. If they had been at a neighboring table, we wouldn't have thought much about it.

At family gatherings that last several days, there are long stretches when people go off and do their own thing. However, when mealtime comes around, everyone puts the stuff away and we talk.